The Furious Spinner

We went to see Hoax, the movie about the Clifford Irving hoax. (He got a million bucks from his publisher by telling them he was interviewing Howard Hughes for his autobiography.) I remember when this happened. Not enough to know if the details in the movie were accurate, but the movie was interesting. After the movie, Mario and I said we understood the reason Irving decided to deceive. He was a writer; his last book did poorly; his publisher wouldn't give him the time of day let alone another book contract; he had to pay his bills. What to do? What to do?

It's a crazy business.

As I was looking around for literary hoaxes, I came across the story of I, Libertine. Have you heard of this? Jean Shepherd (A Christmas Story, etc.) was annoyed about how bestsellers lists are made. So Shepherd asked his radio listeners to go into bookstores and ask for this fictional book, I, Libertine by Frederick Ewing. Apparently bookstores had so many requests that it did get on bestseller lists. Eventually Shepherd, along with Theodore Sturgeon, actually wrote I, Libertine. (Although Sturgeon may have written all of it; I'm not sure. Someone knows, but not moi.)

Court TV has a list of other literary hoaxes.

No, I'm not contemplating a literary hoax. That would be too much work. I write novels. I make stuff up all the time.

Labels: movies

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